Chaos, Order, and Hope
by CamsthiSky
Summary: Family. He always had to remember that no matter what, they were family. And with his family, on his ship with his crew, he could be free. Kind of a sentimental one-shot. Enjoy(:


**Yes, yes, I'm back! Woohoo. I'm super, super sorry if this is wrong in anyway, but I had serious writer's block. I asked someone about it and they told me to write something that I had knowledge about but hadn't thought about in a while and I choose One Piece. So thank you to my best friend in the whole wide world for pushing me to do this. Tell me what you think about it. Read and Review.**

**Disclaimer: Don't own it and I never will**

* * *

There was chaos and there was order. You choose one or the other. You can't have both. It just wasn't possible in the rules of the world to let freedom be what it was. And all people try and find a way to bend that freedom to their own will.

Take the navy for instance. It didn't matter if you help people out or not. A pirate is a pirate. Breaking one rule is just like breaking all of them. To them, there's a good side and there's a bad side. And if you oppose the navy and their ideals, you are automatically put on the side of the evil. The navy stands for order.

And pirates. What was so bad about being a pirate? Well there are lots of things bad about it. Always on the run. Can't settle down. Sometimes you have nowhere to go back to. But pirates, they could create their own definition of freedom. They didn't have to conform to the navy's ideals if they didn't want to. And that's exactly why Luffy loved being a pirate. The pirates stand for chaos.

There were no more rules, no more people trying to bend you to their own will. He could be truly free, with his own definition of freedom. He could spend every day the way he wanted to.

His definition of liberty was spending his days with his crew looking for adventure. He didn't care about gold. He had his friends, and he needed no other treasure.

And freedom-

_This is too complicated._

"Luffy?"

Luffy groaned as his stomach growled with hunger. He didn't have time to be thinking about these stupid thoughts. Not when he was _so_ hungry. The tinge of pink on the cloudy horizon told him that it was time to eat. Luffy leaped off of the figurehead and onto the deck of the Sunny, giving Zoro a big grin.

"Hey Zoro."

"What were you doing?"

"Trying to smell for adventure!"

Zoro stared with his one eye a moment before shrugging and turning towards the kitchen. "Sanji said dinner's ready. I came out to get you since you were late."

"Meat!" Luffy cried enthusiastically. "I can't believe I almost missed it!"

Zoro nodded as he led Luffy towards the smell of wonderful, wonderful food.

"Yeah, it's not like you to miss a meal."

And just like that, both Zoro and Luffy froze, taking in what the green-haired first mate had said.

* * *

_It's not like you to miss a meal._

"I'm not hungry."

"You're always hungry."

Luffy said nothing as he hugged his knees closer to his chest.

Despite eating a devil fruit, he was no less human. He just didn't have an appetite anymore. How could he? He hadn't moved on just yet. He just wanted to stay curled up in a little ball until the pain went away. But experience told him that it never would.

Luffy heard Zoro sigh from where he was standing somewhere next to him. Zoro was the only one who really knew the extent of his pain. He was the only one he could trust right now. Right now, when things felt so hopeless and he could feel nothing but pain.

Where had his determination gone? Maybe it had crumbled into nothing, just like his strength. Did his crew really rely on him that much that they had to blind themselves in order to keep following him? It felt like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders when in fact his burden should have been lightened. He was down two crewmates, so shouldn't that mean he should be bearing less responsibility?

Everyone was still looking for Robin, even when she had told them not to. For all of Luffy's lost strength, he wouldn't willingly let her go. Not the way she did. He didn't believe she would really do that to them. Something was wrong.

But it was Usopp that weighed so heavily on his shoulders. One of his first crew members had now turned his back on his own crew for a broken ship. And Luffy couldn't blame him. Luffy tried to be a leader, he really did. Most times, he would joke and play around, but when it really counted, he tried. This was his family and he couldn't bear to lose them.

And instead, he had lost _two_. No. _Three_. Because whether she was broken or not, the Going Merry was still a part of his crew. She would be missed, and she was family, but he had made the decision to give her peace. And hopefully her spirit could be passed onto their new ship. That was what he had hoped when he had made the decision, but with Usopp's words, he felt like nothing but a murderer.

"Luffy." He jumped at the sudden call of his name. He hadn't noticed Zoro crouching in front of him. "If you don't have the strength to find Robin, what do you think will happen to this crew?"

Luffy sniffled, wiping the silent tears from his cheeks. He knew Zoro was right. He was the captain and whether or not he had let Usopp go or not, Robin was of the most importance at the moment. Whatever she had gotten herself into, it was Luffy's job, as her captain, to make sure she came back to the crew.

Luffy nodded and took Zoro's offered hand, giving him a small hopeful smile. For now, it was best to just take things one step at a time. And step one? Find Robin.

* * *

Luffy smiled sadly at the way things had turned out back then. They had gone through hell and back but he had managed to find hope again.

"Dinner then?"

Luffy's small smile turned into a full-blown grin. "Hell yeah! I want some meat! Sanji!" he yelled, running past Zoro and into the kitchen. He stretched his hand and grabbed a particularly juicy looking piece of steak. "Gimme some meat!"

His answer was a swift kick to the head. "DAMN RUBBER-HEADED CAPTAIN! DON'T TAKE NAMI'S FOOD!"

Yeah, it was nice to be free.


End file.
